Posted on 03/23/2009 1:40:16 PM PDT by Mrs. Don-o
“We have invited the president and he's honored us by accepting," Jenkins said. "We are not ignoring the critical issue of the protection of life. On the contrary, we invited him because we care so much about those issues, and we hope for this to be the basis of an engagement with him."
Dear Bishop D’Arcy,
Does Fr. Jenkins think you, and the USCCB, and the Church --- all the rest of us --- are total idiots?
You don’t “engage” with a person who is embroiled in massive, murderous moral wrong by inviting him onto a floodlit, nationally-televised public platform and giving him an honorary Law Degree.
You “engage” by dialog, by debate, by challenge, by confrontation.
You use right respect, right reason, and right judgment.
Censure is called for.
Reprobation is called for.
“Judgment” is called for.
Fr. Jenkins’ defense of his decision to honor Barack Obama is simultaneously so smooth and so stupid, that I am convinced it expresses an underlying contempt.
How does this add up?
The selected man: the most consistent proponent of state-sanctioned killing of the innocent ever elected to public office in the United States. (*See accompanying list.)
The acts: comprehensive immediate material cooperation with unjust killing on a catastrophic scale *
The consequence: the highest honors a Catholic University can bestow.
The decision to an honorary Law Degree upon Barack Obama means at least two things:
• Obama’s record of advancing the practice of abortion, infanticide, and euthanasia means nothing so very dishonorable in the eyes of the leadership of the University of Notre Dame, and
• Notre Dame’s identity as a Catholic University means nothing that makes a dime’s worth of difference in its most public, identity-defining acts.
The defiance: Everyone knows that the “Parent-Teacher Organization” at the parish of “St. Otilie the Obscure” would not be allowed to invite an unrepentant Klansman, or anti-Semite, or pornographer, or abortion-promoter to accept a public honor.
Everyone bets, however, that President Obama is too big to disinvite, and Notre Dame is too big to discipline.
It’s bigger than the Diocese. It’s bigger than the Church. It’s bigger than God.
Bishop D’Arcy, if Notre Dame University pulls this off, it will mean to the hundreds of millions who are watching, Catholics and non-Catholics alike, that when push comes to shove, being Catholic doesn’t mean a goddamn thing.
But what can you do? God help us, what can you do?
Bishop D’Arcy, this is well within your authority as a Successor to the Apostles:
I’m no canonist and I'm no Catherine of Siena – just an ordinary over-talking and under-performing sinner like the rest of us. But I beg you to take this suggestion seriously. This is as serious as a heart attack --- in the heart of the Church in America.
You have the ring, the mitre, and the crozier. The crozier means you are to protect the lambs and seriously dismay the wolves, and not the other way around.
As God’s most unworthy servant, I beg you.
[signed]
*Material cooperation with unjust killing and other intrinsically immoral acts.
A partial--- not a comprehensive --- list.
Infanticide (2002) The Induced Infant Liability Act would have protected the right to humane medical treatment and palliative care for babies that survived late-term abortions. As an Illinois legislator, Obama voted against it and finally killed it in committee.
Abortion: As a U.S. Senator, Barack Obama received the following scores on NARAL Pro-Choice America’s Congressional Record on Choice:
2007: 100 percent
2006: 100 percent
2005: 100 percent
Euthanasia: a deadly paradox: voted in 2005 (along with a unanimous U. S. Senate) in favor of the right of a brain-injured woman (Mrs. Terri Schiavo) to a Federal judicial review of a lower court’s decision that she should be starved and dehydrated to death. Subsequently, Obama repeatedly stated (e.g. during the first televised presidential primary debate on MSNBC) that that was the ONE vote he regretted during the time when he served in the U.S. Senate.
As President: among his first acts as U.S. President were his decisions to:
THIS --- AND THE LANDSLIDE OF LITIGATION THAT IT INVITES --- THREATENS THE ENTIRE CATHOLIC HEALTHCARE SYSTEM AND EVERY CONSCIENTIOUS HEALTHCARE WORKER IN AMERICA.
Then, please write very respectfully, very carefully, and very unambiguously to Bishop John M. D'Arcy.
He is reported to be a Catholic and a vertebrate.
Please considering making prominent use of the word "interdict."
Send two copies to the two chancery offices:
Bishop John D'Arcy
Fort Wayne Chancery
1103 S. Calhoun Street
Fort Wayne, IN 46801
(260) 422-4611
Bishop John D'Arcy
South Bend Chancery
114 W. Wayne Street
South Bend, IN 46601
(574) 234-0687
Didn’t ND try to pull something similar a year or two ago with another speaker and the alumni forced them to retract the offer by withholding donations?
Too bad Ted Bundy is dead. I don’t believe he ever finished his legal degree. I am sure he would have loved to be engaged in discussions with Notre Dame’s coeds.
Bingo. It seems Notre Dame is just trying to become another secular, liberal university.
Fr. Jenkins is a BAD Catholic! He is leading children on a wrong path.
I agree that Obama’s contempt for life is the fundamental issue here. But also, how on earth can the President of Notre Dame justify an honorary law degree to someone who has never done anything whatever in the fields of law or politics to deserve it?
As President of the Harvard Law Review he broke a long tradition by writing NOTHING for the review he headed.
As instructor of consititutional law in Chicago he argued that the Constitution need to be rewritten, but he never wrote a single scholarly article.
As a lawyer, he forced banks in Chicago to make subprime loans, leading to our current economic crisis.
As a politician, he did practically nothing in either of his two earlier positions, and he has so far done nothing as president, other than shirk his responsibilities, appoint numerous abortionists to top posts in his administration, and party.
Even aside from the basic issue that Obama is a death-dealer, what has he done to earn an honorary law degree? Nothing, zero, nada, zilch.
ND actually has a large and active Catholic community, and about 130 Masses every week on campus. Interdict would be a severe mercy. It would be medicinal. It would be tough love. It would be not directed toward any individual, but toward Notre Dame itself as an institution under discipline.
It is a very solemn thing.
And it would blow the place sky high.
I’m not for punishing INNOCENT people because of a BAD PRIEST.
It’s the University of Notre Dame not Notre Dame University. The latter is in Lebanon.
Outstanding. I do hope that the USCCB, Cardinal Levada, Cardinal Burke, or possibly even Pope Benedict XVI himself encourages Bishop D’Arcy to speak in the strongest possible terms with Fr. Jenkins.
Excellent letter and information. Thank you. I’ve begun my own letter.
Giving an honorary law degree to this man, is a symbol of approval, for all the laws he’s already signed and probably will sign against life. When he’s signing FOCA, he can have a photo-op waving this law degree from ND. A sign of approval. It’s beyond the pale.
Will Fr. Jenkins also propose that ND replace Touchdown Jesus with The Messiah?
The Bishop has canonical authority to do this, and do it quickly. As I understand it, it doesn't take a lot of rigmarole from Rome or anyplace else. No person is named. A PLACE is named. And the Bishop has total, undisputed authority to say where Mass and the Sacraments CAN and CANNOT be performed in his Diocese.
Sorry...but this is an AWFUL idea........Punish Fr. JENKIN....not the students.....or other faithful teachers and office people.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.